Paul Keres Memorial Tournament
# Paul Keres Memorial Tournament

The Paul Keres Memorial Tournament is a chess tournament played in honour of chess grandmaster Paul Keres (1916–1975). It usually takes place in Vancouver, Canada and Tallinn, Estonia.

An annual international chess tournament has been held in Tallinn every other year since 1969. Keres won this tournament in 1971 and 1975. Starting in 1977 after Keres' death, it has been called the Paul Keres Memorial Tournament. From 1991, the tournament has been held yearly and changed into a rapid event. From 1999 this tournament also had a women's section. In the past twenty years, apart from this rapid tournament, several other memorial tournaments have been played in honour of Keres.

In 1975, Keres won a tournament in Vancouver. It was his last tournament he would ever play in, as on his way back to his native Estonia, he died from a heart attack. There has been an annual memorial tournament in Vancouver ever since.

## Tallinn

### Tallinn International

The Tallinn International has been held every other year from 1969 to 1989. It was named after Keres from 1977.

    #YearWinner 11969Leonid Stein 21971Mikhail Tal Paul Keres 31973Mikhail Tal 41975Paul Keres 51977Mikhail Tal 61979Tigran Petrosian 71981Mikhail Tal 81983Mikhail Tal Rafael Vaganian 91985Sergey Dolmatov 101987Mikhail Gurevich 111989Georgy Timoshenko Lembit Oll Jaan Ehlvest

### Tallinn Rapid

From 1991 the Tallinn international has been replaced by an annual rapid tournament. From 1999, the tournament has had a separate women's section.

    #YearWinnerWomen's section 11991Anto Remmel 21992Leonid Yudasin 31993Jaan Ehlvest 41994Viktor Korchnoi 51995Lembit Oll 61996Vassily Ivanchuk 71997Viktor Gavrikov 81998Suat Atalık Lembit Oll 91999Viktor GavrikovTatiana Stepovaia 102000Vassily IvanchukTatiana Stepovaia 112001Jan TimmanViktorija Čmilytė 122002Viktor GavrikovDana Reizniece 132003Alexander MorozevichPia Cramling 142004Alexei ShirovMaia Chiburdanidze 152005Alexei ShirovEkaterina Kovalevskaya 162006Vassily Ivanchuk Anatoly Karpov Rustam KasimdzhanovIlze Bērziņa 182008Vladimir MalakhovIlze Bērziņa Viktorija Čmilytė 192009Alexey Dreev Vasily YemelinElisabeth Pähtz 202011Alexei Shirov 212012Alexei Shirov 222013Alexei Shirov 232014Igor Kovalenko 242015Sergei Tiviakov 252016Igor Kovalenko

### Keres Memorial Festival

In the 1990s there have been several Keres memorials in Tallinn which were played at regular time control. These tournaments seem to have been held irregularly. At present there is an annual Keres Memorial Festival which started in 2004 with a special rapid tournament, where Viswanathan Anand emerged as a winner, followed by a regular tournament. The winners of the regular tournament for 2004 and subsequent years are listed below. The field of these tournaments has been notably weaker than that of the rapid tournaments.

    YearWinner 2004Kaido Külaots Artem Smirnov 2005Meelis Kanep 2006Mikhail Rytshagov 2007Georgy Timoshenko 2008Vasily Yemelin 2010Olav Sepp 2014Alexandre Danin

## Vancouver

The tournament in Vancouver has been played ever since Keres won it in 1975. It was Keres' final tournament, as he died shortly thereafter.

| # | Year | Winner |
| - | - | - |
| | 1975 | Paul Keres |
| 1 | 1976 | James Tarjan |
| 2 | 1977 | John Watson |
| 3 | 1978 | Robert Zuk |
| 4 | 1979 | Peter Biyiasas John Grefe James McCormick |
| 5 | 1980 | Viktors Pupols |
| 6 | 1981 | John Donaldson Ray Fasano |
| 7 | 1982 | John Donaldson Eric Tangborn |
| 8 | 1983 | John Donaldson |
| 9 | 1984 | Leon Piasetski Gordon Taylor Jeremy Silman Robert Zuk |
| 10 | 1985 | John Donaldson Lionel Joyner John Braley |
| 11 | 1986 | Kevin Spraggett |
| 12 | 1987 | Tom O'Donnell |
| 13 | 1988 | Alex Kuznecov Kevin Spraggett |
| 14 | 1989 | Jüri Vetemaa |
| 15 | 1990 | Jonathan Berry John Donaldson |
| 16 | 1991 | Ľubomír Ftáčnik |
| 17 | 1992 | Ľubomír Ftáčnik |
| 18 | 1993 | Igor Štohl |
| 19 | 1994 | Jonathan Berry Jüri Vetemaa Gary Basanta |
| 20 | 1995 | John Hallam Jüri Vetemaa Yan Teplitsky |
| 21 | 1996 | Georgi Orlov |
| 22 | 1997 | Yan Teplitsky |
| 23 | 1998 | Kevin Spraggett |
| 24 | 1999 | Yan Teplitsky Georgi Orlov Jack Yoos |
| 25 | 2000 | Vladimir Epishin |
| 26 | 2001 | Georgi Orlov |
| 27 | 2002 | Fanhao Meng Georgi Orlov Jack Yoos Besnik Beqo |
| 28 | 2003 | Georgi Orlov |
| 29 | 2004 | Georgi Orlov |
| 30 | 2005 | Jack Yoos |
| 31 | 2006 | Alfred Pechisker |
| 32 | 2007 | Georgi Orlov |
| 33 | 2008 | Georgi Orlov Bindi Cheng |
| 34 | 2009 | Jack Yoos |
| 35 | 2010 | Jack Yoos Georgi Orlov Katerina Rohonyan Manuel Rivas Pastor Roman Jiganchine |
| 36 | 2011 | Georgi Orlov Maxim Doroshenko |
| 37 | 2012 | Jack Yoos |
| 38 | 2013 | Georgi Orlov |
| 39 | 2014 | Georgi Orlov |
| 40 | 2015 | Jason Cao |
| 41 | 2016 | Tanraj Sohal |
| 42 | 2017 | Tanraj Sohal |
| 43 | 2018 | Tanraj Sohal, Stanislav Kriventsov |
| 44 | 2019 | Georgi Orlov, Raymond Kaufman |
| 45 | 2021 | Peter Yong Qiu |
